42nd Coney Island Mermaid Parade to make a splash

Who doesn’t want to be part of that world?

Coney Island will dive under the sea Saturday afternoon, when thousands of decked-out revelers show off their fin-ery at the 42nd annual Mermaid Parade.

“It truly is not just the greatest day in Coney Island, or Brooklyn, but probably in the entire city,” said Adam Rinn, the artistic director of the non-profit Coney Island USA, which produces the event.

Over 3,000 participants are expected to turn out for the 1 p.m. parade, where an estimated 200,000 spectators will ogle at the ornate sea life-inspired floats, costumes, and other creations finagled out of beads, sequins, and all manner of dinglehoppers.

Revelers at the Coney Island Mermaid Parade in 2023. Stefano Giovannini

“It’s a wacky event in the birthplace of wackiness,” Rinn gushed.

Theater performer Kate Dale, who has participated in the parade since the early nineties, is the winningest mer-person in the parade’s history.

“I’ve won Best Mermaid three times, possibly four times. And I’ve won Best Push-Pull Float three or four times,” Dale told The Post during a brief break from parade prep on Friday afternoon.

Dale first saw the parade in the early 90s, and immediately knew she wanted to participate, she recalled.

“I knew, this is it for me. It was kitschy, it was campy, it was crafty,” she added.

Acclaimed performer and parade emcee Shelly Watson is also known for her elaborate get-up – and even designed her costume for this year to hold up against the forecast.

A mermaid mural on Coney Island pictured the day before the big event. Paul Martinka

“There’s possible thunderstorms,” Watson told The Post. “So I had the wherewithal to base my costume off of one of those umbrella hats. And so I decorated that with sea life and made it like a little jellyfish.”

The year’s creation, including a sequined skirt that mimics fish scales, took about six hours to make, Watson added.

The Juilliard grad and opera singer has been involved with the Mermaid Parade for around 25 years, and started emceeing the event alongside Bradford Scobie last year.

For her emcee debut, Watson concocted a towering headdress inspired by a 1930s Ziegfeld Follies look.

“That took me weeks,” she recalled.

Over years, Watson added, her favorite part of the parade is admiring the other costumes – especially family groups that incorporate their little kids and pets into the fun.

Costumes are the highlight of the annual parade. Stefano Giovannini

“Last year, there was a King Neptune with a mermaid, and they dressed their baby and their dog in little lobster outfits,” she explained.

“But as a designer and costume creator myself, I’m always blown away at the amount of work that some of these people put in to build huge ships that can be pedaled on a bicycle. It’s incredible.”

Watson also noted how parade-goers look beneath the surface for their costume ideas.

“Many times I ask a person and say, ‘what is that costume?’ And they’ll say, ‘Oh, well, this is a horned seahorse.’ Or, you know, an angler fish that we don’t get to see, like those lantern fish and things like that,” she told The Post.

“The one thing that we know the least about is the ocean, and they’re constantly finding new species as we get closer to the ocean floor.”

A reveler at last year’s parade. Stefano Giovannini

“[The costumes] go from not wearing anything to wearing big, heavy suits and everything in between,” Adam Rinn agreed. “Every single one is a work of art.”

The guests of honor at the Mermaid Parade are the king and queen of the festivities, Rinn explained.

This year, artist Joe Coleman and his wife, Whitney Ward, got the plum parts. But one of Rinn’s personal parade highlights was in 2010, when the late rocker Lou Reed and his wife, performance artist Laurie Anderson filled the roles.

“I love Lou. I was in the same room as him, I got to shake his hand,” Rinn recalled of the star sighting. “I had to control the fan boy in me!”

For eager first-time Mermaid Parade goers, Rinn promised “the most surreal experience you can have in New York” – even though an oppressive “heat dome” is currently hovering over the festivities.

“It really is an amazing dream come true. It’s just this colorful, vibrant, you know? You’ll think ‘what did I stumble into, and can I get more?’”